Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories

								

obediently turned the leaves of the large album, politely scanning the
placid countenances of departed Minks for several generations.
Miss Mink, moving about in the inner room, glanced in at him from time
to time. After the first glance she went to the small store room and got
out a jar of sweet pickle, and after the second she produced a glass of
crab apple jelly. Serving a soldier guest who had voluntarily adopted
her country, was after all not so distasteful, if only she did not have
to talk to him. But already the coming ordeal was casting its baleful
shadow.
When they were seated opposite one another at the small table, her worst
fears were realized. They could neither of them think of anything to
say. If she made a move to pass the bread to him he insisted upon
passing it to her. When she rose to serve him, he rose to serve her. She
had never realized before how oppressive excessive politeness could be.
The one point of consolation for her lay in the fact that he was
enjoying his dinner. He ate with a relish that would have flattered any
hostess. Sometimes when he put his knife in his mouth she winced with
apprehension, but aside from a few such lapses in etiquette he conducted
himself with solemn and punctilious propriety.
When he had finished his second slice of pie, and pushed back his chair,
Miss Mink waited hopefully for him to say good-bye. He was evidently
getting out his car fare now, searching with thumb and forefinger in his
vest pocket.
"If it is not to trouble you more, may I ask a match?" he said.
"A match? What on earth do you want with a match?" demanded Miss Mink.
Then a look of apprehension swept over her face. Was this young man
actually proposing to profane the virgin air of her domicile with the
fumes of tobacco?
"Perhaps you do not like that I should smoke?" Bowinski said instantly.
"I beg you excuse, I--"
"Oh! that's all right," said Miss Mink in a tone that she did not
recognize as her own, "the matches are in that little bisque figure on
the parlor mantel. I'll get you to leave the front door open, if you
don't mind. It's kinder hot in here."
Five o'clock that afternoon found Miss Mink and Alexis Bowinski still
sitting facing each other in the front parlor. They were mutually
exhausted, and conversation after having suffered innumerable relapses,
seemed about to succumb.
"If there's any place else you want to go, you mustn't feel that you've
got to stay here," Miss Mink had urged some time after dinner. But
Alexis had answered:
"I know only two place. The Camp and the railway depot. I go on last
Sunday to the railway depot. The Chaplain at the Camp advise me I go to
church this morning. Perhaps I make a friend."
"But what do the other soldiers do on Sunday?" Miss Mink asked
desperately.
"They promenade. Always promenade. Except they go to photo-plays, and
dance hall. It is the hard part of war, the waiting part."